Tag Archive | witchcraft

It’s time for the first of the Harvest Festivals, we know it as Lughnasadh for Celtic paths. Also known as the summer fire festival it is always a fun event to honor the changing seasons!

As with most things on the pagan calendar, different traditions celebrate and recognize seasonal festivals at different times of the year. Here in the northern Hemisphere, Lughnasadh is recognized on August 1st or 2nd. It’s the time to recognize and honor Gratitude, Abundance, and bring things to Fruition (Getting it done!)

In the Southern Hemisphere this is the time for Imbolg, the Festival of Lights, when honoring the goddess Brigid and Purification, Initiation, and Dedication to one’s path is recognized.

There are many ways to give thanks and honor during this 1st harvest festival. It celebrates the warmth of the sun, the rain and the faery folk who help tend to the gardens, flocks and fields. As a Celtic festival of the harvest, what better way to give thanks than to prepare a meal with the harvest of your own garden.

Which ever holiday you observe, may it be a wonderful and blessed celebration!

From all of us here to all of you;
Merry Lughnasadh & Imbolg!!Springwolf 🐾

The time of Spring is upon us here in the Northern Hemisphere as the Sun begins his return to warm our hearts and extend his light in our day. His return rings in the first of the Spring Holidays known as Imbolc, Imbolg, Brigid’s Day or the Festival of Lights.

In the Southern Hemisphere the summer is marked by its peak of the Sun during the Fire Festival. It is the time of Lughnasadh, also known as Lammas or the Fire Festival which honors the Celtic hero Lugh. It is the first of the Pagan Harvest Festivals and the time of year to thank the Tuatha Dé Danann (the Faeries) for their help in our gardens.

These Sabbats (Pagan Holidays) are observed on February 1st or 2nd, depending on one’s personal Tradition (spiritual denomination). Because Pagans celebrate on a Lunar Calendar schedule, our holiday observances actually begin at sunset on the evening before the scheduled day.

Those who recognize February 1st as the observed holiday, will begin their rituals on January 31st. While others, like my Clan, being our celebrations tonight and observe the holiday on February 1st.

This year we’re blessed with the energy of GrandMother Moon’s full phase, ringing in the Snow Moon for the north and the Thunder Moon of the south.

Everyone here at Springwolf Reflections and Spring’s Haven extend our wishes to you and yours for a wonderful and joyous celebration of warmth and light. Where ever you are in the world,

In ancient history, many cultures hold tales concerning a Sacred King. Back then a King was a form of deity, or was placed on a throne by Divine hands. As such they were worshiped as much as they were revered and honored. The Sacred King we’re going to talk about comes from the early pagan days of the Celts.

In this tale, the Sacred King is associated with the Sun, and in some variations with the Sun God Lugh who is honored during the 1st Harvest Festival known asLughnasadh, celebrated on August 1st in Northern Hemisphere. Elements of this story are scattered through pagan festivals throughout the year, and have been passed on through the generations of practitioners primarily through oral tales. Even today, most Pagans celebrate these events in our modern festivals and rituals, but often as separate events instead of one long story arc.

In his writings, Sir James George Frazer describes in a book called The Golden Bough (1890–1915); the sacred king represented the spirit of vegetation. He came into being in the spring, reigned during the summer, and ritually died at harvest time, only to be reborn at the winter solstice to wax and rule again.

Elements of Frazer’s book, document Pagan tales celebrated throughout the cycle of the year in one story. There are elements of the Holy and Oak King, who share governance of the seasons as they wax and wane between summer and winter. There’s the association of the fertile spring equinox when the Great God and Maiden Goddess unite and reign through the summer. And the outcome of that union in the fall, which provides for an abundant harvest season. Continue reading →

December 21st marks the Winter Solstice for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere. Solstice celebrations are expected to be held all around the world, recognizing a variety of secular and non-secular events. But the Solstice also rings in the time of Yule for yet another variety of people, Pagans.

Pagan observance of Yule begin at Sunset on December 20th, 2017.

Have you ever wondered why we call this time Yuletide? Why is there a Yuletide log? Or what about Yuletide carols? Well of course these are things that evolved overtime. Most are rooted in Paganism, some were co-opted by other religions in an effort to convert Pagans, typically to Christianity. And some have nothing to do with Pagans at all.

Yuletide is a combination word. Yule + tide. It’s the tide part people don’t generally give much thought to in our modern observances. But let’s talk about that for a moment. Continue reading →

According to my “Moon Phase: Pro” app, December’s full moon occurs at 10:47am Sunday December 3rd, 2017 Eastern US time. Thanks to modern science we can pinpoint the exact time of each moon phase. And thanks to theU.S. Naval Observatory’s Astronomical Applications Departmentand the internet, we don’t need an app to help us find those precise moments.

In centuries past, the folks we like to call the Ancient Pagans, didn’t have the precise tools we have today. They did have their own eyes and their early forms of astronomy to help them track the heavenly bodies in the sky. All around the world they used early methods to mark the important times of what know today as the months and the seasonal changes to honor the spirits and the natural world in their lives.

They may not have understood the concept of perigee within the celestial bodies, giving rise to some wondrous myths and legends. Today we know that Perigee occurs once a year when the moon is at its closest point to Earth during its orbit around the planet. This makes the Moon appear larger from our perspective, than we usually witness. Continue reading →

About this time each year, I used to publish a Moon Phase Calendar. It helped me plan out rituals and observations for spiritual and magik work during every phase of the moon. With the advent of Cell phone technology, it’s much easier today for people to load up an app and set their own reminders. So I stopped creating the calendar.

I still get asked at almost every cycle of the Full Moon, why I no longer publish the calendar. I wrote about this in 2014 here on my blog: Moon Phase Calendar – Update.

We would like to send out a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has sent messages and prayers to Spring during her recent health battle.

“I’ve quickly learned why folks with brain injuries get so frustrated during their healing process. 2 steps forward and 4 steps back.” Spring said recently. She continues to work on the brain exercises that are designed to strengthen the brain while rebuilding new pathways where necessary. It’s along and hard process, but progress is being made.

We would like to extend a thank you to everyone for your patience during this ordeal. We are not able to provide a schedule for the Daily Tarot Meditation Drawing. But you can still follow Spring’s progress and thoughts, along with some inspirational shares on here Facebook page.

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"Believe In Yourself, Even When No One Else Does."
~ Harvey McKay ~
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“Take a chance on faith. Not religion, but faith. Not hope, but faith. I don’t believe in hope. Hope is a beggar. Hope walks through the fire and Faith leaps over it.”
~ Jim Carrey ☆ 2014
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“I describe myself as a simple Buddhist monk. No more, no less. And I am one of the seven billion human being. Basically we are the same… your emotion, my emotion, your mind, my mind.., same physical. So I always look [at it] that way. We are the same.”
~ Dalai Lama 2012 ~
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"Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless, like water. If you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle and it becomes the bottle. You put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Now, water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.”
~ Bruce Lee 1971

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